*This post is part of our Faith in Action: Moral Courage for a Nuclear-Free Future series by Danny Hall
On Monday, September 15th, I joined a powerful Moral Monday livestream—part of Moral Mondays: A Southern Call to Conscience, the protest movement founded in 2013 by Bishop William J. Barber II. Rooted in nonviolent moral resistance, Moral Mondays centers impacted people, faith leaders, and moral voices who demand that elected officials enact policies that serve the poor and protect human dignity.
I’ve previously attended Moral Monday gatherings in person in Washington, D.C., and reflected on those experiences in two blog posts:
📝 Crying Out for Change: The Moral Call for Justice (May 1, 2025)
📝 “You Will Not Kill Us Without a Fight”: Moral Monday & Fighting Policy Violence (July 1, 2025)
This third reflection continues that journey. While Moral Mondays does not directly address nuclear policy, the testimonies I heard on September 15th made the connections painfully clear. The same budget that slashes SNAP benefits and shutters rural hospitals is investing billions in nuclear weapons infrastructure. The same logic that treats Anna Romano’s life—a disabled South Carolinian surviving on SNAP and Medicaid—as expendable is the logic that enables unchecked launch authority and the machinery of global annihilation.
Negotiable lives. Non-negotiable weapons.
This blog is part of my commitment to naming those connections—building solidarity between movements too often siloed, and calling for a moral uprising that confronts violence in all its forms: economic, racial, ecological, and nuclear.
Anna’s Story: “I Plan Every Dollar. I Still Don’t Know If I’ll Eat.”
Anna Romano lives in Greenville, South Carolina. She’s a survivor—of chronic kidney disease, of mental health challenges, of a system that makes survival feel like a daily negotiation. She relies on Medicare, SNAP, and the Medicaid-funded Extra Help program to afford her medications and the food that keeps her kidneys functioning.
“I take medication every day to slow my brain down. I follow a strict diet. I live independently. But I live on a fixed income. I plan every dollar. And I still don’t know if I’ll be able to afford food next month.”
Anna has already exhausted her lifetime limit for inpatient psychiatric care. She’s not asking for charity—she’s asking for survival. But while she waits on hold with government agencies, Congress is preparing to spend $141 billion on the Sentinel ICBM program—a new generation of land-based nuclear missiles. That money could fully fund SNAP for years.
The same budget that leaves Anna in limbo is investing in weapons that would vaporize entire communities.
That is not security.
That is abandonment at scale.
Karen’s Story: “If the Hospital Closes, My Parents Will Die”
Reverend Karen Roberts serves in rural North Carolina. Her father and stepmother are in their 80s, still working a small farm recently devastated by Hurricane Helene. Their greatest fear isn’t the weather—it’s losing access to the emergency care that has saved their lives more than once.
“Blue Ridge Regional Hospital has saved their lives. But it’s one of five hospitals in our region projected to close. If it shuts down, they’ll have to drive an hour for care. They won’t make it.”
Karen’s story is not an outlier. Across rural America, communities are bracing for similar losses. In states hosting the Sentinel ICBM program—Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, Nebraska, and Colorado—72 rural hospitals are at risk of closure. Medicaid cuts proposed in federal legislation could strip coverage from hundreds of thousands of residents across the five Sentinel ICBM-hosting states, with Montana alone projected to lose more federal Medicaid funding per capita than any other state.
Meanwhile, the Department of Defense is preparing to build new missile silos and launch facilities in these same rural regions—part of the Sentinel ICBM program, which is replacing the aging Minuteman III system. Although the Air Force has confirmed that extending Minuteman III to 2050 is technically feasible, it has opted to move forward with Sentinel construction, citing engineering risks and silo degradation. The program has already triggered a Nunn-McCurdy breach due to massive cost overruns, yet Congress continues to fund it—while hospitals in rural North Carolina, Montana, and Wyoming face closure and families brace for the loss of life-saving care.
It’s a brutal truth we must name plainly: the same system that funds annihilation abroad is abandoning dignity at home—especially in rural America.
Joel’s Story: “I Will Be Burying My Congregants”
Reverend Joel Simpson walked through his community on Good Friday, stopping at food pantries, nursing homes, and immigrant congregations. He learned that 28% of his county relies on Medicaid. That SNAP recipients are tripling. That schools and nursing homes are bracing for cuts.
“I’m a pastor. I know what death looks like. And with this budget, I will be burying the people who die because of these cuts.”
Joel’s congregants include aging parents, disabled children, and first-generation college students—all of whom depend on the very programs Congress is slashing. And while they brace for loss, the federal government is preparing to spend nearly $1 trillion on nuclear weapons over the next decade.
Joel’s testimony is not just a warning.
It’s a moral indictment.
We cannot claim to value life while funding systems designed to end it.
Alexis’s Story: “We Were Raised to Show Up”
Reverend Alexis Carter Thomas co-convenes Moral Mondays in South Carolina. She was raised in a Black Baptist church in Tennessee, where neighbors took up collections to pay utility bills, showed up at school board meetings, and ran for city council.
“We were taught to care for our neighbors. And now, we’re showing up at Senator Graham’s office to say: we will not stand for death-dealing policies.”
Alexis continues this work in the legacy of her ancestors—those who faced threats, spoke out, and refused to be silent. Her organizing is rooted in community care, but she’s confronting a federal budget that prioritizes nuclear weapons over nourishment.
South Carolina is home to key nuclear weapons infrastructure, including the Savannah River Site—now undergoing a $25 billion expansion to produce plutonium bomb cores for new warheads. It’s poised to become the most expensive building project in U.S. history, despite growing criticism over its necessity and environmental risks. Meanwhile, faith communities like Jubilee Baptist Church are responding to surging food insecurity in the same region.
Alexis’s story reminds us:
Nuclear violence begins with the decision to fund destruction instead of care.
A Moral Blueprint for Change
That’s why I support H. Res. 317 in the House and S. Res. 323 in the Senate—resolutions that call for a decisive shift in U.S. nuclear policy. Introduced by Representatives Jim McGovern and Jill Tokuda, and by Senator Edward Markey, these measures urge the United States to:
- Actively pursue a world free of nuclear weapons as a national security imperative
- End sole presidential launch authority
- Adopt a no-first-use policy
- Cancel plans for new nuclear weapons
- Preserve arms control agreements like New START
- Support communities harmed by nuclear testing and production
- Support a just economic transition for the nuclear labor force
- Redirect nuclear spending toward healthcare, housing, education, and climate resilience
These resolutions do more than tweak policy.
They represent a moral commitment to disarmament—to ending the systems that threaten life on a planetary scale and investing instead in the dignity of our communities.
They are not abstract.
They are rooted in the lived realities of people like Anna, Karen, Joel, and Alexis.
They offer a path forward—away from destruction, toward dignity.
We Will Not Go Quietly
As Bishop Barber reminded us:
“Don’t lose your mind in this moment. Don’t give in to fear. Don’t walk away. We have not been given a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.”
Across the country, people are living that truth. The Back from the Brink campaign now includes over 500 endorsing organizations, 25+ regional hubs, and growing support from 50+ Members of Congress. Students for Nuclear Disarmament are mobilizing Gen Z across 15+ campuses. This is not quiet. This is a moral uprising.
We believe in a future where budgets reflect compassion, not cruelty.
Where security is measured by the health of our communities—not the size of our arsenals.
Where no one is disposable.
We will not be quiet.
We will not normalize violence.
We will organize for life.
To learn more about the Moral Mondays movement and stay connected, click here.
*Faith in Action: Moral Courage for a Nuclear-Free Future
Faith traditions have long stood at the forefront of movements for peace, justice, and the sanctity of life. In this blog series, Faith in Action: Moral Courage for a Nuclear-Free Future, we explore how people of faith are responding to the moral and existential crisis posed by nuclear weapons. Through reflections, event recaps, and contributions from our interfaith partners, this series offers a space for spiritual voices calling for disarmament—and a reminder that confronting the threat of nuclear annihilation is not just a political issue, but a deeply human and moral one.
While Back from the Brink is a secular campaign, we are proud to stand in solidarity with faith-based partners who see nuclear abolition as both a spiritual imperative and a call to justice. Together, we bear witness—and take action—for a future free from nuclear weapons.
If you’re part of a faith group that’s interested in getting involved with Back from the Brink, you can reach out to Danny Hall at danny@preventnuclearwar.org.
